Apr 12, 2011
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Absence Makes the Team Mate Scorned
“Out of sight, out of favor,” as a colleague phrased it.
We tend to trust the opinion of those who we’ve seen last.
This is especially true when managers of parallel level are away on vacation for a while. If you’re minding the shop for them, this distance can color the way you interact with management above and the team below, particularly if you share resources.
If you’re coming back from vacation, keep this in mind and prepare to re-insert yourself into the organization and ongoing processes.
A further application is In virtual teams or virtual work environments. It pays to take things with a grain of salt, remembering that both your opinion, and the environment which is receiving it, might be colored by distance.
A great example of this is an interview I recently conducted for a developer along with a team mate who was remote. The team mate picked-up on a communication issue with the developer. I listened to him but was skeptical. I’d sat with the developer and talked to him. He seemed like a fine communicator and gave off a good vibe. We gave the developer a test project. Within an email or two it became clear that communication was an issue. He wasn’t understanding the words we were using (basic words that were fundamental to the domain). My team mate had been proven right and we stopped further interviews with the developer. Being physically in the same location had influenced my ability to pick-up on the issue my team mate had sensed.
That knife cuts both ways - giving an edge to those nearby and harming those farther away.
[...] “Out of sight, out of favor,” as a colleague phrased it. We tend to trust the opinion of those who we’ve seen last. This is especially true when managers of parallel level are away on vacation for a while. If you’re minding the shop for them, this distance can color the way you interact with management above [...] Vertabase Blog [...]